On the 12th of May, some ptarmigans were seen. These were hailed as a sure omen of returning summer. Several of the men went out on shooting excursions; and, being exposed, for several hours, to the glare of the sun and snow, became affected with that painful inflammation in the eyes, called "snow-blindness." As a preventive of this complaint, a piece of black crape was given to each man, to be worn as a kind of short veil, attached to the hat. This was found to be sufficiently efficacious. But a more convenient mode was adopted by some of the officers: they took out the glasses from spectacles, and substituted black or green crape in their place.
In the beginning of May, the men cut the ice round the Hecla. This was done by means of axes and saws, and with astonishing labour; for the ice was still more than six feet thick. On the 17th, the operation was completed, and the ships were once more afloat.
Captain Parry and Captain Sabine, accompanied by ten other persons, officers and men, set off, on the 1st of June, to make a tour through the island. They took with them tents, fuel, and provisions; and carried their luggage in a small, light cart, to which the sailors occasionally fastened their blankets, by way of sails. They travelled by night, as well to have the benefit which any warmth of the sun might give during their hours of rest, as to avoid the glare of its light upon the snow. The vegetable productions which they observed, were chiefly the dwarf willow, sorrel, poppy, saxifrage, and ranunculus. The animals were mice, deer, a musk ox, a pair of swallows, ducks, geese, plovers, and ptarmigans; with some of which they occasionally varied their fare. The tracks, both of deer and musk oxen, were numerous; and one deer followed the party for some time, and gambolled round them, at a distance of only thirty yards. The soil of the island was, in general, barren; but, in some places, it was rich, and abounded with the finest moss. On one part of the beach, the travellers found a point of land eighty feet above the sea: this they named Point Nias, after one of the officers of the party; and they had the patience to raise on it, as a memorial of their exertions, a monument of ice, of conical form, twelve feet broad at the base, and as many in height. They enclosed within the mass, in a tin cylinder, an account of the party who had erected it, with a few silver and copper English coins; and Mr. Fisher, the assistant surgeon, constructed it with a solidity which may make it last, for many years, as a land-mark; for it is visible at the distance of several miles, both by sea and land. In one place, within a hundred yards of the sea, the remains of six Esquimaux huts were discovered. After a fortnight's absence, the party returned to the ships.
The approach of summer now began to be apparent, from the state of vegetation on the island; and, during the warm weather, a great quantity of sorrel was daily gathered. The hunting parties also brought in an abundance of animal food. The total quantity obtained, during the continuance of the vessels at Melville island, was 3 musk oxen, 68 hares, 53 geese, 59 ducks, and 144 ptarmigans; affording, in the whole, 3766 pounds of meat.
On the 22d of June, the men were delighted to observe that the ice had begun to be in motion; and, on the 16th of July, the snow had entirely disappeared, except along the sides of caverns, and in other hollows, where it had formed considerable drifts. The appearance of the land was, consequently, much the same as it had been when the ships first reached the island. The walks which the men were now enabled to take, and the luxurious living afforded by the hunting-parties, together with the abundant supply of sorrel, which was always at command, were the means of completely eradicating the scurvy; and the whole of the ships' companies were now in as good health, and certainly in as good spirits, as when the expedition left England.
After having made an accurate survey of Winter Harbour, where the vessels had been frozen up nearly eleven months, Captain Parry resolved to quit it. Accordingly, on the 1st of August, the vessels weighed anchor, and stood out to sea. Towards the west, the direction in which they were proceeding, the sea, at first, presented a very flattering appearance, being more clear of ice than it had been a month later in the preceding year, and presenting a fine navigable channel, two miles and a half in width, which, from the mast-head, appeared to continue as far as the eye could reach.
They had not, however, proceeded many leagues westward of their winter quarters, when the wind blew directly against them, and their course was further opposed by a strong current, which set towards the east. To these difficulties, great danger was soon added, from the drifting and pressure of the ice, which threatened the Griper, in particular, with total destruction. They penetrated to the longitude of 113 degrees 48 minutes, being the westernmost meridian hitherto reached, in the Polar Sea, to the north of America. But they had made so little progress, and were in such incessant danger; and the officers had so little hope of being able to effect any further discoveries of importance, during the present season, that Captain Parry at length determined to return.
On a consultation with his officers, respecting the best course to be pursued, it was resolved that, in their voyage homeward, they should run along the edge of the ice, with the intention of availing themselves of any opening that might lead towards the coast of America. It was not till the 26th, that the ships got clear of Cape Providence; but, after that, they had an open channel, and sailed before the wind, with such rapidity, and so little interruption, that, in six days, they cleared Sir James Lancaster's Sound, and were once more in Baffin's Bay. They now stood along the western shore of this bay, which they found indented with several deep bays or inlets.
On the 3d of September, they passed some icebergs, which were a hundred and fifty or two hundred feet above the surface of the water; and, soon afterwards, in an inlet, which Captain Ross had named the River Clyde, the voyagers saw four canoes, each of which contained an Esquimaux. These approached the ships; and the men, at their own desire, were taken on board. Three of them were young, and the fourth about sixty years of age. They appeared to be much pleased; and expressed their delight by jumping, and by loud and repeated ejaculations. Although there was no interpreter, they bartered several articles, in a manner that showed they were no strangers to traffic.
Some of the officers landed, and went to visit two Esquimaux tents, which were situated within a low point of land, that formed the eastern side of the entrance to a considerable branch of the inlet. The inhabitants, men, women, and children, on beholding them, came running out, with loud and continued shouting. Two of the women had infants slung, in a kind of bag, at their back, much in the same manner as gypsies are accustomed to carry their children. There were seven other children, from twelve to three years of age, besides two infants in arms.